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“Needless to say,” Hunt stepped in, “we have quite an assortment to choose from.”
“Hey, those are for research purposes,” she scolded him playfully.
“My kind of research,” Charlotte added with a giggle.
A comical conversation went on for a little while over the various types of condoms. As the table was being cleared, my mother came to my side. “You might want to go talk with your daughter. I think she was a little concerned with your announcement.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” I told her. She kissed the top of my head and carried the plates to the kitchen sink.
I excused myself from the table and made my way out to the barn. Tyler and Marisol were pouring feed, and Tonya was standing at the side of the paddock, looking perturbed.
I joined her, staring over the land behind my parents’ house. “What’s on your mind?”
“Do you like Ms. Nickels?”
“I do.”
“When you said you slept with her, did that mean—”
“Mean what?” I asked after a few seconds of her hesitation.
“Does that mean you had sex with her?” Her cheeks grew slightly pink.
I inhaled and exhaled loudly. “Yeah, that’s what I meant. I forget how grown-up you are.”
“I thought you were only supposed to have sex with people when you loved them.”
“Hmm,” I responded and thought for a moment. “That’s a complicated answer, Tonya.”
“So, I can go out and have sex with anyone, and it’s okay?”
I turned and looked down at her. “No, that isnotokay. You are way too young to be thinking about having sex with anyone.” I shook my head. “Look, there is a difference in having sex when you are a teenager or young adult and when you are my age.”
“What’s the difference?”
Jesus, what was the difference? How did I explain this to my daughter? “Once you are an adult, you’ll be able to decide who you share your body with and who you don’t. It’s a complicated answer, but yes, you are supposed to love someone before you have sex with them.”
“Do you love Ms. Nickels?”
“Honestly?”
She nodded.
“No, I don’t know her well enough to love her, but I do like her.”
“Is she going to be our new mom?”
“Whoa, that’s not even a consideration right now. Nolan and I are getting to know one another, and at our age, sex is part of the process. I know that doesn’t make sense, but I do like Nolan, and—” I paused. Did I admit this to my daughter? Yeah, I think she needed to know. “And Nolan is the first woman I have been with since your mother. Your mom has been gone a long time, and it wasn’t until I met Nolan that I even wanted to move forward.”
Tonya was only six when her mother passed, and while she had a few memories of her, they’d been dulled with time. “Do you think Mom would mind?”
“Mind me moving on? No, she wanted me to. She told me she wanted me to move on.”
“She did?”
“Yeah, honey. Your mother knew she was dying, and she knew that I still had a lot of life left to live. She wanted me to be happy and find someone else. It’s just taken me a very long time to get to that point and to find someone who interested me enough to take a chance.”
“Okay.”
